tompkins square park riot

Last week saw the release of Ten Thousand Saints, which we’ve been looking forward to ever since the film reenacted the Tompkins Square Park riot last year. The adaptation of Eleanor Henderson’s novel revolves around a hippie father, Les (Ethan Hawke), who brings his teenage son, Jude (Asa Butterfield), to the tumultuous East Village in 1988, the year of the riot.

While living with his way-too-chill, pot-smoking dad, Jude becomes absorbed in the straight-edge punk scene and fascinated by a rich, uptown girl (Hailee Steinfeld). Varietydescribes the film as a “love letter to a bygone era of New York City,” and, because we have our own love affair with that time and place, we played jealous lover and did some snooping. We spoke with directors Shari Springer Berman and Robert Pulcini (American Splendor, Girl Most Likely, The Nanny Diaries) about how the East Village of the 1980s intertwines with the lives of the characters, why Ethan Hawke is the ultimate New Yorker, those silly lap dogs on the Upper East Side, and Springer Berman’s accidental involvement in that epic clash of police and residents.

It’s going to be a throwback weekend off of Tompkins Square Park. Not only is Clayton Patterson holding court Friday at Pyramid Club, but on Saturday and Sunday, the annual concerts commemorating the Tompkins Square Park Riot — which he so famously documented — return to the park.

In addition to performances by hippie holdover David “The Pope Smokes Dope” Peel and the usual array of hardcore/punk bands with names like Nihilistics and Transgendered Jesus (no Porno Dracula this year?), parkgoers will be treated to a free installment ofThe Voluptuous Horror of Karen Black, courtesy of the East Village’s own Kembra Pfahler. Keep Reading »

A slew of East Villagers — including poet Bob Holman and Times writer Colin Moynihan — shuffled into Anthology Film Archives last night to watch Clayton Patterson’s 3.5 hours of footage of the Tompkins Square Police riot, on its 25th anniversary.Keep Reading »

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Bedford + Bowery is where downtown Manhattan and north Brooklyn intersect. Produced by NYU’s Arthur L. Carter Journalism Institute in collaboration with New York magazine, B + B covers the East Village, Lower East Side, Williamsburg, Greenpoint, Bushwick, and beyond. Want to contribute? Send a tip? E-mail the editor.